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Article: I switched to eSIM in 2025, and I am full of regret (arstechnica.com)
submitted 9 months ago by to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[–] 30 points 9 months ago (4 children)

The ability to swap it to a new device without carrier approval is a big one for me.

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  • [–] 7 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (3 children)

    This sounds like a your carrier problem, not an eSIM problem.

    I've swapped eSIMs between devices 3 times this year at my own leisure, no involvement from the carriers, no back and forth calls or visiting a store.

    From what I can tell reading these comments, people don't actually have an issue with eSIM (it's literally just like your regular SIM card and the spec absolutely allows you to move it between devices with zero friction), they have an issue with how some carriers implement them, in particular how some lock down how you can move an eSIM to a new device.

    Seems like carrier implementation should be more standardized.

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  • [–] 9 points 9 months ago* (1 child)

    I would agree to an extent, but I dislike another step or dependency to change phones. With a physical sim I don't need to login to a carrier site for it to function, don't need to call their support, don't need to wait for activation times, only their towers gotta be working.

    With an esim I need to change identifiers linked to the account, which takes time to propagate through the network, and also needs authentication either by a text message, login or calling support to change the account.

    The path of least resistance is clear. Swap a physical sim? or authenticate and change the esim, and wait for it to sync. No brainer for me.

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  • [–] 2 points 9 months ago*

    But I don't need to do any of that either. My phone's settings have a transfer option for eSIMs and it passes the eSIM data to another phone.

    No need to interact with the carrier app, no need to interact with the internet, no need to login to anything.

    I guess activation times could be a thing but mine is always immediately active so I never noticed it.

    So that leads me to my previously stated conclusion: eSIM isn't the issue, carrier implementation is.

    I don't disagree with using physical either btw, I'm just saying in theory they're the same. In fact your carrier could just as easily lock down your physical SIM.

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